[moustachefox]

This was my original beat board. My topic has changed, although elements of this remain in the current boards. Elements of this board were inspired by  depression and other problems my friends and I have been facing. I know it's very a la mode and done to death, and I wasn't particularly creative with it. But I liked the idea of a little monster that would refuse to let  you go and instead grew and grew. I feel this board is much clearer than my current run. I may return to some of these ideas.

[moustachefox]

Some WIPs and concepts for my Juniour film. I'm very unhappy with the storyboards, but I was boarding abstract concepts to go with some writing I'm preparing. I think they have too many similarities to past themes I've dealt with and are not related enough to the issues I want to discuss. Some part of them will probably survive, but not much.

[moustachefox]

Boar Attack

[moustachefox]

Freak Kitchen - Freak of the Week - Official Music Video So here's some new animation by one of my favourite comic artists behind 'Blacksad'. Incredible vibrant lines that make me love these animated rock stars even when all they do is grin maniacally. Oh, the power of animation compels me to sell my soul to rock music. To think Disney would steer me so wrong!

[moustachefox]

I’m to meet Cameron Fraser, the producer of this short. It’s beautifully streamlined, I must say. I love it when films can be this short and snappy, and utterly memorable. British accents never hurt, either.

[moustachefox]

How I made my shoes.

[twigryph]

[moustachefox]

How to Make Eyes

Step 0 :

The holes in my beads were too big, so I was obliged to fill them with Milliput before starting. After, I drilled a hole in them that was much smaller. Later I’ll be using that pinhole to move the eye around. You’ll want to paint the pupil over this hole.

Step 1 : Put your eye on some wire, or a small nail. Be careful that the paint doesn’t make any ‘mountains’ around the base of wire. Then dip the eye into a pot of enamel based paint. This paint is usually available at model and hobby shops. I got mine from ‘Wonderland’ here in Edinburgh, but I’ve seen it around in Vancouver, too. Be careful about selecting either a Matte or Gloss paint, and whether it is Acrylic or Oil based as well. I actually did a no-no of putting acrylic paint based paint on oil in a later step, but so far I’ve not had any ill effects - possibly because the area was so small. Even so, ask someone when you purchase the paints which are OK to put  on top of others.

NOTE : THIS PAINT TAKES 6-8 HOURS TO DRY, AND SOMETIMES LONGER. BEFORE PRECEEDING TO EACH STEP, IT’S BEST TO WAIT A DAY, OR AT LEAST MAKE IT THE FIRST AND LAST THINGS YOU DO IN A DAY. So yes, this will take a while.

Step 2 : The Iris

Now, I had several pictures of this, but some weird computer glitch has misplaced the folder they were in. But it’s easy enough to describe. Insert one end of the wire with your bead on it into an electric drill. Make sure that when you turn it on it spins centrally. Putting some paint on a brush, hold it lightly against the eye. It will spin into a perfect circle. I started with a dark blue, and the next day (after it had dried) put a light blue on top, leaving the dark blue outline around it. Then I took my Exacto knife and a bit of wire and scored some light lines leading into the center in order to help it resemble a real eye.

Step 4 : The Pupil

I found it easiest to do this with a bit of wire, because it was so small and my brushes were a bit too big. But you may have one small enough.

Step 5 : Enamel

Finally, when your eye is finished and dry, dip it into some enamel, available where you get the paint. Wipe off the excess. I hung my eye upside down from my desk so it would move down onto the iris and form a sclera. Careful - too much and it will appear brownish.

Step 6 : Poke

Using a needle, poke through the paint to that hole you drilled at the beginning. Or you can drill the hole now, as well. I did it both ways and found rediscovering the hole made less mess, but it wasn’t too big a difference. Using this hole you’ll move the eye around with a needle or pushpin.

Eezypeez.

[moustachefox]

Here's a sample of some if the original thumbnails, to let you know that yes, the animatic is an improvement.

[moustachefox]

A rough animatic to be used for my film. Still a lot of ideas floating about.

[moustachefox]

Character Design

Let's talk character design.

It's something I've spent some time reading up on and enjoying, but for the most part I'd say it's something of a minor weakness. Acting through a design is an important way to communicate information about a character.

I needed to convey a sense of contrast between my characters, and yet tie them together visually in the same world.

Here is some early concept work :

 Not my best work, and frankly the characters are posed very similarly.

Oh, and in case you want to meet the kid behind the drawing:

Mom loved taking pictures with the sun behind her. Still does. Now you know why I have no good family photos.

Here's another set of early ink sketches. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find my pictures of the finished sketches and designs - I'll take some sometime soon, but essentially I decided on a design for the child that was three and half heads tall and emphasized childishness, messiness, curiosity and slight suspicion the character holds for the cat trespasser.

The cat's final design is largely unchanged from the first images I drew. While I did make many drawing trying to settle on a style, I eventually settled on a design that was more mysterious and aloof than the more naturally expressive child.

Here's a selection of early, rejected sculpts. (Shudder).

The final sculpt. A lot of time was spent trying to cast this puppy. In the end, I resculpted it out of Milliput and Fimo.

The Finished Puppets.  In order to tie their designs together, I used paper in their construction - for hair and fur, accordingly. Many elements in the world are also of paper.

Examples of artists I find good inspirations for character design

Heidi Smith

The breakout star of ParaNorman, I adore her textures and devilmaycare pencil work. Very freeing.

Tracy Butler

I learned quite a bit from Butler by looking at the shapes she chooses in constructing her cat-run world in her comic Lackadaisy.

Her tutorials are very simple and wellput.

Ollie Johnson

The author of The Illusion of Life, I found his chapter on Penny and Rufus, the cat, from the Rescuers, to be very helpful in characterizing my own cat and girl. He really understood kids in a way I hadn't thought about, especially the casual way they interact in the world and their careless and easy relationship to animals.

Also  http://characterdesign.blogspot.co.uk/ 

is a useful corner of the internet.

[moustachefox]

ECA - Beaulne - 07

Sunday; noun: traditionally the day of the week when people exert as little energy as possible.

All respects to René Magritte, of course.

I feel like discussing this would just bring me to new highs of pretentiousness, forcing me to punch myself.

But really, it’s just a parody of a far superior work. Also, I’d like to work with real film again someday. I sort of squandered my chance in first year.

[moustachefox]

GIFs from my Tuesday 10x10x14 film

[moustachefox]

GIF Set from my 10x10x14 film, Monday

[moustachefox]

Tumblr Ate my 10, 000 word Epic Poem Update Post

It was in Iambic Pentameter and everything. Seriously, you missed out on a treat. I spend two days writing and poof. Not even in the drafts folder despite saving several times. Tumblr, why? WHY WHY WHY?

(Also I have other posts I've written that are trapped on my Wifiless iPad.)

Well, it was mostly babbling anyway. I just talked about the people I've met and some of the infrastructure here, which I guess I'll just review quickly.

We have a few projects coming up; sometimes companies or other groups of people approach the our department and ask for films. We've been asked to make a film about Homelessness in Scotland based around a prerecorded song. That won't happen for another month.

We are having a 'pop-up cinema' event called the Hidden Door Festival. If you're in Edinburgh,come along.

http://hiddendoorblog.org/

We are currently working on a 'Memory' Project. I explained it in the last post, but I haven't the energy to do it all in detail again. Essentially, we recorded a track of us describing a childhood memory which we then animate.  I want to focus on the fallibility and personification of memory, as well as trying to capture some of the bleakness of my early childhood. (Don't worry, I had a happy childhood, but also a lonely one out in the country with no other kids my age.) The film is primarily about the isolation of childhood, and how this is destroyed. An interesting parallel in real life is that my country home is slowly becoming more developed, with new houses and roads being built around it.

But from the derth of great and wonderful memories my parents ensured I was well-travelled and well-educated enough to have, I've picked the original and genius idea of when I got my cat.

I've only ever had the one cat, I swear! I got him a year after I moved to my childhood home and he died as I was leaving home, so his lifespan was equal to my childhood, essentially. I also thought our contrasting personalities would be interesting to explore in animation.

Sorry for the long time no post, they will come once the WiFi is installed here!

[moustachefox]

ECA - Beaulne - 05

A film meant to be dedicated to Bulgarian filmmaker Donyo Donev.

Animated with Adobe After Effects and Photoshop.

Unfortunately it received no sound. Perhaps I'll add some later.

The idea going into this was to work with puppets in After Effects, which I'd done a little with earlier in Second Year. For a single day's film, I was pleased with how much I was able to do. If you're wondering what was up with the hybrids, we were meant to create a film that addresed the work of Donyo Donev. My favourite short of his was the Intelligent Village

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5Su-8BNWXI.

It's a wonderful film that satirically addresses how the government was likely to solve problems while Donev was working there. Deciding to borrow the premise, I thought about recent articles I'd been reading about genetically modified foods and the damage its production is doing to the environment and human bodies. I particularly remember the story of farmers in Colombia being forced to plant genetically modified seeds that grow plants that do not have seeds themselves, forcing them to buy seeds the next year from the same supplier.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/colombians-successfully-revolt-against-seed-control-and-agricultural-tyranny/5352534

Other things I learned, such as the horomones used to help cows lactate that little extra to fill the cereal bowls of the American public instead of the comparitvely less demanding calf, have unknown hormonal effects on people. But frankly, I think I make enough estrogen on my own, thanks for offering.

http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2006/12.07/11-dairy.html

I decided to take a political stance as Donev did, hoping to imply that something as small as altering a fly would end up affecting everyone. Perhaps the needle originally supposed to 'alter' the fly would have helped that message, but somehow I forgot about it in that happy 3AM gap. And yes, the old lady who swallowed a fly was not far from my mind. Also,  the frog's jaw repeatedly refused to render, and after I spent two hours trying to make it appear, I was forced to let my nemesis, Computer Problems, win once again. If I go back to add my own sound and fix the animation a bit, I may face that evil jaw once more.

I don't normally make films that take a stance on world events, but I do find meddling with the stuff that will eventually be re purposed into bits of Chantal to be worrisome.

So in reflection, this film needs a bit more work, and someone to volunteer to do the soundtrack. Takers? No? Guess it's time to multitask again.

[moustachefox]

ECA - Beaulne - 11 (Doomsday)

The last film, made in a few hours. Easy to miss what it's all about. I couldn't decide whether to take a perspective that would make the joke obvious, and perhaps funny, or to do what I eventually did, which was to almost hide it. If I remade it I might make it obvious second time around, but I think I like this version, in which the world ending is almost something you could miss. Instead of being dramtically lines up before the camera as I originally pictures, I decided to back off and make it something that happened in the periphery. No explosions, monsters, grand plots, superheroes or last minute fire fights. Call it my antiHollywood film if you must.

[moustachefox]

ECA - Beaulne - Dragostinov - 10

Saturn’s Day. Saturn is the god of agriculture and time. His festival is Saturnalia, which takes place on the Winter Solstice.

I remixed the sound to go with my piece. It's by St. Dragonstinov, and his wonderful choir. It was made from the bits and pieces I found in the animation room, with most of it coming from the materials abandoned by our tech, Neil, with the conclusion of his film. Bits of seagull feather, sea-worn rope, stones and seashells all came in handy, while the dried flowers were found tucked on a windowsill. Oh the treasure trove!

It was fun to explore time and mortality in the context of Saturday, a day a normally consider one of the most cheerful of the week.